Obituaries in 1995

Obituaries in 1995

Agha Saadat Ali, who died on October 25, 1995, aged 66, was among the best fielders in the early years of Pakistan cricket. He appeared in one Test--against New Zealand at Dacca in 1955-56--when he scored eight not out and took three catches. Otherwise he played only intermittently, mainly for Punjab and Lahore, between 1948-49 and 1961-62. Both his sons played first-class cricket.

ALLEN, MICHAEL HENRY JOHN, died on October 6, 1995, aged 62, after a long illness. Mick Allen made a sensational start to his career with Northamptonshire in 1956. He was unusual, anyway, because he was a public schoolboy (Bedford) and a professional. On his debut against Worcestershire, he scored 51 but did not bowl. In the next match he took eight successive Nottinghamshire wickets for 88. He rarely had such spectacular days again but settled into being a steady left-arm spinner, his orthodox, well-flighted style providing the foil for the fiercer bowling of the two Australians, George Tribe and Jack Manning. Allen had a smooth action and rarely bowled badly, and was a good close catcher. He made a habit of bowling well against Derbyshire--victims of his career-best eight for 48--and they signed him after Northamptonshire let him go in 1963. This phase of his career was not a great success, and he retired in 1966.

ALLOM, MAURICE JAMES CARRICK, who died on April 8, 1995, aged 89, achieved cricketing glory at Christchurch in January 1930 when he became the first man to take a hat-trick on Test debut--and four wickets in five balls. He bowled Stewart Dempster with the second ball of his eighth over in Test cricket, then dismissed Tom Lowry, Ken James and Ted Badcock with the last three deliveries, reducing New Zealand to 21 for seven in their first ever Test match. Allom only played four further Tests, all overseas, but he was a highly effective amateur swing and seam bowler. Being almost 6ft 6in, he had the height to make the ball come sharply off the pitch; he regularly dismissed good players and sometimes frightened them. Alf Gover recalled Arthur Carr, the Nottinghamshire captain, complaining to Percy Fender, leading Surrey, when he was flattened by an Allombouncer: This is no way to play cricket, Percy. Carr had Larwood and Voce on his side at the time. Allom was a Cambridge Blue in 1927 and 1928 and played regularly for Surrey at first, but his appearances were gradually limited by the demands of his family business. His record speaks of quality: 179 matches and 605 wickets at 23.62. He was a skilful saxophonist who played with Fred Elizalde's band in the 1920s, and wrote two jolly books, The Book of the Two Maurices and The Two Maurices Again, with his friend and namesake Maurice Turnbull. Privately, he had a great sense of fun. This was less obvious when he found himself president of MCC in 1970, the year of the crisis over the South African tour, eventually called off after Government pressure. He followed this with eight less turbulent years as president of Surrey.

AMOS, GORDON STANLEY, who died on April 7, 1995, aged 90, was one of Queensland's stalwarts in their early years of Sheffield Shield cricket. He played in their very first Shield match in 1926-27--but for New South Wales. By running out Leo O'Connor in the closing stages for 196, he ensured that his team won by eight runs, thus beginning Queensland's long run of failure in the Shield. He subsequently moved north and helped to mitigate the disasters in 20 matches, bowling fast-medium. Among his 49 first-class wickets was that of Bill Ponsford--caught and bowled for 437. Amos spent another season in New South Wales in 1931-32 and did not play first-class cricket again for another five years, when he turned out again for Queensland, and hit 93, his highest score, with five sixes. Ten days before his death, Queensland finally won the Shield; the news delighted him.

BARBER, ERIC GEORGE, who died on April 20, 1995, aged 79, was a professional batsman in the Coventry League and played two matches for Warwickshire in 1936.

BARBOUR, ROBERT ROY PITTY, who died on December 29, 1994, aged 95, was one of the last living first-class cricketers born in the 19th century and almost certainly the last man alive to have played a first-class match against M. A. Noble. This was on Barbour's debut, for Queensland v New South Wales in November 1919, when Noble was nearly 47, and playing his last match. Barbour was an opening bat, who played one subsequent match for Queensland, and four for Oxford University when he was a Rhodes Scholar. He became senior classics lecturer at Melbourne University.

BARRATT, ROY JAMES, died in February 1995, aged 52, after a heart attack. Basher Barratt was a slow left-arm bowler who played 70 matches for Leicestershire between 1961 and 1970; he acquired his nickname through his uninhibited tail-end batting. His bowling was characterised by a low, very round-armed action, and his attitude to the game was noticeably carefree--helped by the fact that his family had a prosperous building business. The firm's contracts included the new Grace Road pavilion; this went up in the midst of his playing career, with Barratt in the thick of the building work. He was a popular team man who continued playing village cricket until his sudden death.

BEE, AMIR, who died on January 26, 1995, aged 85, was the mother of four Pakistani Test players-- Wazir, Hanif, Mushtaq and Sadiq Mohammad. A fifth son, Raees, was twelfth man in a Test and Hanif's son, Shoaib, has also played Tests. She was herself a local badminton champion, and brought up the family single-handed after the death of her husband in 1948.

BEESON, RONALD NEAVE, who died on August 9, 1995, aged 57, was Lincolnshire's wicket-keeper from 1957 to 1966. In his final season, he captained the county to their only Minor Counties Championship.

BENNETT, FREDERICK WILLIAM CECIL, OBE, who died on January 26, 1995, aged 79, was chairman of the Australian Cricket Board in the difficult years from 1983 to 1986, when Australian cricket struggled against the consequences of the mass defection of players to South Africa. He was a wicket-keeper for Balmain in Sydney grade cricket, and a good baseball player. However, he made his name as a hard-working administrator, first with Balmain, then with New South Wales, where he was chairman for nine years, and finally on the ACB, which he joined in 1967. He was manager of six Australian touring parties, including three to England: 1972, 1975 and 1981. After retiring from a management job with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, he started his own business and regularly went to the office at 6 a.m. until shortly before his death; he continued jogging into his seventies. He was one of those Australians who treated everyone equally, said David Richards, chief executive of ICC. Always very affable at the start but very firm if he had to be. He was a wonderful friend to the game. Mike Gatting, who spent several seasons at Balmain, scored a century in the Adelaide Test the day after Bennett died, and dedicated the innings to him and the Middlesex scorer Harry Sharp.

BHAYA, JAMSHED NUSSERWANJI, who died on June 25, 1995, aged 87, was a prominent attacking batsman in the 1930s when India were emerging as a Test-playing country. He played in two unofficial Tests, and after the Indians beat the 1935-36 Australians in Lahore was borne aloft by the crowd--for his fielding, it was said. He made 106 against the same touring team for Central India.

BOUCHER, JAMES CHRYSOSTOM, who died on December 25, 1995, aged 85, was possibly Ireland's finest cricketer. Jimmy Boucher bowled big off-breaks from a medium-pacer's run-up and confounded good batsmen for over a quarter of a century. His 28 first-class matches, all for Ireland between 1930 and 1954, produced 168 wickets, at 14.04, a better average even than Hedley Verity. His figures included six for 30 and seven for 13 against successive touring teams, the 1936 Indians and the 1937 New Zealanders, and seven for 39 in a one-day match against the 1947 South Africans. He was top of the averages in Wisden in 1937 and 1948, though he would not have qualified under the modern system, which requires bowlers to bowl in ten innings. Boucher habitually bowled with three short legs and no extra cover, which he considered a sign of weakness, and refused to defend even on the rare occasions he was collared. The Irish belief that he could have played for England was not tested: he never left his clerk's job at the electricity board in Dublin. He was reputedly invited to join Lord Tennyson's 1937-38 tour of India, then heard no more. Boucher gave up playing in 1954 to become secretary of the Irish Cricket Union until 1973. He was a bachelor, obsessed with cricket and cricket talk, who loved every aspect of the game--except limited-overs cricket, which he abhorred.

BROMAGE, PETER ROBERT, who died suddenly on July 20, 1995, aged 61, was an important administrator in both cricket and rugby union, and had just been appointed chairman of the new Rugby Football Union executive. In cricket Bromage was chairman of the TCCB's disciplinary committee. He was a successful Birmingham solicitor who was on the Warwickshire committee for 13 years, and redrafted the club's' constitution.

BROWN, ALBERT, who died on April 27, 1995, aged 83, was a fast-medium bowler who played once for Warwickshire, against the Indians in 1932. He was a leading snooker player and reached the semi-finals of the world championship four times, but retired from the game in 1954 when snooker was so much in the doldrums he could not make a living.

CALDER, HARRY LAWTON, who died in Cape Town on September 15, 1995, aged 94, was both the youngest ever and the oldest surviving Wisden Cricketer of the Year. Calder was chosen as one of the School Bowlers of the Year in 1918 when there was no regular selection because of the war. He was in the Cranleigh XI for five years as a bowler of varied medium-paced spinners. But he played little cricket after leaving school, when he went to South Africa, and did not know he had ever been a Cricketer of the Year until he was tracked down in 1994. The Calder story appeared in the 1995 Wisden, page 275.

CAMERON, FRANCIS JAMES, died in February 1995, aged 71. Jimmy Cameron was a Jamaican batsman and off-spinner who was studying in North America when he was called to go on West Indies' tour of India and Pakistan in 1948-49. He played in all five Tests, scoring an unbeaten 75 at Bombay, but took only three wickets. He played league cricket in England for many years. His older brother, Monkey Cameron, also played for West Indies. Jimmy is not to be confused with the Francis James Cameron who played for New Zealand.

CARR, MICHAEL LEWIS, who died on September 29, 1995, aged 62, kept wicket for Cambridge University against Warwickshire at Fenner's in 1953.

CHILVERS, HUGH CECIL, who died on December 1, 1994, aged 92, was an Australian leg-spinner, born in Hertfordshire. He was unlucky that he was taken to a country where he would be a contemporary of both Grimmett and O'Reilly. So he never played Test cricket but instead bowled regularly for New South Wales, taking 151 wickets at 26.39 between 1929-30 and 1936-37, including 11 instances of five or more in an innings. Chilvers had a bouncing approach to the wicket, suggesting the traditional leg-spinner's hopeful enthusiasm. He was indeed enthusiastic: he played Sydney grade cricket until he was in his late fifties.

CLARK, ARTHUR HENRY SEYMOUR, who died on March 17, 1995, aged 92, was an engine driver from Weston-super-Mare and one of the most improbable of all county cricketers. Seymour Clark never played the game at all before he was 25, when he was drafted in to keep wicket for a makeshift railwaymen's side. He turned out to be a brilliant natural wicket-keeper, with fantastic reflexes, and quickly became first choice for the Weston town club. Three years later, when the regular Somerset keeper Wally Luckes was ill, Clark was brought in and, though he had trouble getting time off from the railway, played five matches in 1930. He kept magnificently; however, he is mainly remembered for his batting, which was hopeless. Clark thought his highest score in club cricket was three, and two of them came from overthrows. He bought a new bat when he was picked for the county, but hardly ever made contact, failing to score a run in nine innings (though twice at Kettering his partner got out before he could). Peter Smith of Essex tried to give him one off the mark, and produced a ball that bounced twice before it reached him; Clark still got bowled. He was offered a contract for 1931 but thought the Great Western Railway offered more secure employment. I got a tremendous kick out of playing for Somerset, he said later, but it seemed sensible to go back to the locos.

COMMINS, KEVIN THOMAS, who died on October 3, 1995, aged 66, was captain of Border when they were bowled out for 16 and 18 by Natal at East London in 1959-60. He maintained that in the first innings it was a difficult wicket but admitted that second time round the batting was awful. On other days, he was a capable opening bat for both Western Province and Border. He later became Western Province's first full-time administrator. His son John has played for South Africa.

COOKE, NOEL HENRY, who died on February 28, 1995, aged 60, played in 12 first-class matches for Lancashire in 1958 and 1959 as a right-handed batsman and off-spinner. He played a lot of club cricket round Liverpool.

COPE, JOHN JAMES, died on January 28, 1995, aged 86. Jack Cope played three matches for Glamorgan in 1935 with no success. But he was a sound league and Minor Counties batsman, and also played soccer for Bury, Ipswich and Cardiff. He was picked to play football for Wales but had to withdraw because he was born in Ellesmere Port.

COVINGTON, FREDERICK ERNEST, who died on July 3, 1995, aged 82, was a left-hand bat who made 83 on his debut for Middlesex, against Warwickshire in 1936. He played five more matches that year without showing the same form. He captained Harrow in both 1931 and 1932 and made 1,000 runs over those two seasons. Though he appeared twice for Cambridge, he failed to win a Blue.

COX, SIDNEY RONALD, died on April 6, 1995, aged 79. Ronnie Cox was a former army captain who became secretary of Essex in 1972. During his six-year tenure the club slowly became a more commercially-minded operation. He was sometimes vague, but his old-fashioned charm was as effective at winning advertising and sponsorship as more scientific methods.

CRAIB, JAMES DEREK GRAHAM, who died on December 19, 1994, aged 77, scored 62 in 40 minutes against Nottinghamshire on his debut for Cambridge University in 1937. He took four wickets, bowling seamers, in the next match but, puzzlingly, never played again.

CRESSWELL, JAMES ARTHUR, who died on December 2, 1994, aged 91, made 21 appearances as a left-arm fast-medium bowler for Derbyshire between 1923 and 1927 without establishing himself. He later became a policeman.

DAVIES, CONRAD STEPHEN, died on May 9, 1995, aged 87. Con Davies played eight unspectacular matches as an amateur for Warwickshire between 1930 and 1936. But he was a legend as a club cricketer, and played for Alexandra Park for 50 years. In all, he scored 64,000 runs, with 126 centuries, and took 5,000 wickets with his left-arm spin. He became president of the Club Cricket Conference.

DAVIS, DAVID GRANT, who died on March 2, 1995, aged 93, had been the oldest surviving New Zealand first-class cricketer and the only player left alive who played a first-class match for Hawkes Bay. He appeared three times in 1920-21, the province's last year. Against Wellington, he scored 61 in half an hour.

DEPEIZA, CYRIL CLAIRMONTE, who died on November 10, 1995, aged 67, played five Tests for West Indies, four of them as wicket-keeper. He touched greatness when he shared an epic seventh-wicket stand of 347 with his captain Denis Atkinson in the Bridgetown Test against Australia in 1954-55, which remains a world Test record. It was a first-class record as well until surpassed in India in 1994-95. Depeiza walked in with the score 147 for six in reply to 668. The pair batted throughout the fourth day before Depeiza was out in the first over next morning, after 330 minutes batting, for 122. A large collection was taken for the two batsmen; Atkinson gave his share to his partner. Depeiza later came to Britain to play regular League cricket. He settled in Manchester and became a senior insurance official.

DEVERELL, SIR COLVILLE MONTGOMERY, who died on December 15, 1995, aged 89, played one first-class match, opening the batting with the playwright Samuel Beckett for Dublin University against Northamptonshire in 1926. Deverell made two and one. He was later Governor of the Windward Islands and then Mauritius, before becoming secretary-general of the International Planned Parenthood Federation.

DE ZOYSA, LUCIEN, who died on June 11, 1995, aged 78, represented Ceylon against various international touring teams and captured more than 500 wickets as a leg-spinner for Sinhalese Sports Club. He was also a successful cricket commentator, Shakespearean actor, writer and dramatist.

DRAKE, EDWARD JOSEPH, died on May 29, 1995, aged 82. Ted Drake was an apprentice at the Southampton Gasworks before he made his debut for Hampshire in 1931 and shared a vital stand of 86 with Phil Mead against Glamorgan. He made 45 but never reached this score again in the 15 further matches he played over the next six years, first as an amateur and then as a professional. However, he found greater glory in the winters, when Hampshire would have paid him ten shillings a week, as one of the great center-forwards of his era, first with Southampton and then with Arsenal, where he was transferred in 1934 for £5,000. He only won five England caps, but scored 42 goals in the 1934-35 season, an Arsenal record, and went on to manage Chelsea to the 1955 League Championship. He married the girl he met at the gasworks dance, not a detail associated with modern football stars of his magnitude.

EASTERBROOK, BASIL VIVIAN, who died on December 15, 1995, aged 75, was cricket and football writer for Kemsley (later Thomson Regional) News papers from 1950 to 1983 and thus covered all the major domestic matches for many of Britain's largest regional papers. He was a regular writer for Wisden and contributed an article every year from 1971 to 1980. Easterbrook was a much loved member of the press corps with a puckish humour. He claimed that while covering a match from the old Lord's press box, he leaned out of the window to throw away his pencil shavings and the Nottinghamshire batsmen walked in, thinking it was the signal to declare. Once he phoned his office to dictate his copy, announced his name to the telephonist-- Basil V. Easterbrook--to be greeted by the response What league is that in? When he retired he wrote: The craft and practice of cricket writing was my personal window to the sky.

ELLIS, JOHN ALBERT, who died on October 17, 1994, aged 80, played in 22 matches for Queensland as an opening bowler on either side of the war, taking 71 wickets at 32.11. In another era he might easily have played for Australia, but he was already past 30 when he was picked for the Australian XI against MCC at Melbourne before the First Test in 1946-47, and he made no impact on Hutton and Washbrook.

ELMES, CEDRIC JAMES, died on March 9, 1995, aged 85. Ced Elmes was the only New Zealander ever to be out for 99 in first-class cricket and finish his career without scoring a hundred. The innings came against Errol Holmes's MCC team of 1935-36 in the unofficial Test at Auckland. Despite this, he remained a phlegmatic cricketer. He never played genuine Test cricket but was a regular for Otago from 1927-28 to 1940-41, batting left-handed and bowling slow to medium left-arm. Perhaps his best bowling performance also came against MCC, for Otago in 1929-30, when he took five wickets--the top five in the order--for 68.

EWART, GAVIN BUCHANAN, who died on October 23, 1995, aged 79, was a well-known poet and a lifelong cricket enthusiast. He produced many poems on cricket, penning A Pindaric Ode on the 1981 Headingley Test as well as shorter lyrics of wry nostalgia and a squib on the radio commentary team. His most substantial piece, The Sadness of Cricket, was a poignant elegy for the players of the Golden Age:

We'd one at Wellington, that A. E. Relf,who'd bowled for England--long since on the shelf--in 1937 stalled and shot himself.

Remembered bowling in the nets,a little irritable (I thought--but one forgets),doling out stumps to junior games, like doubtful debts,from the pavilion's mean back door.

FENN, MAURICE JOSEPH, who died on April 11, 1995, aged 83, was the best slow bowler produced by Fiji. He was particularly effective when he toured New Zealand in 1947-48, where he was able to add floating in-swing to his normal nagging accuracy, and he took 50 wickets, far more than any other Fijian, at 20.90 in the nine first-class matches he played.

FLACK BERNARD IRVINE, who died on July 31, 1995, aged 81, was Warwickshire's head groundsman from 1955 to 1983. Test cricket returned to Edgbaston two years into his reign and the ground acquired a reputation for good, true wickets, if not quick ones. He was a conscientious groundsman and an early riser who believed in rolling with the dew. In later years, he became the TCCB's inspector of pitches. He was no relation to Bert Flack, the Old Trafford groundsman.

FRASER, THOMAS WILLIAM, who died on July 25, 1995, aged 83, was a South African-born slow left-armer who won a Cambridge Blue in 1937. He took eight for 71 for Orange Free State against Eastern Province in 1939-40.

GADSDEN, WILLIAM BELL, who died on March 18, 1995, aged 84, was a South African medium-pace bowler who took eight for 64 for Natal against Transvaal on his first-class debut as an 18-year-old in 1928-29. After a match return of seven for 47 against Border, he was selected for the tour of England but did not make the trip, apparently because his father said he was too young. Gadsden was included in the squad for the Third Test at Durban against England in 1930-31, but did not play. He played only nine first-class matches in all, but his record remained impressive: 35 wickets at 16.82.

GLOAK, RAYMOND LEONARD, who died on February 10, 1995, aged 62, represented Griqualand West in 33 first-class matches as a batsman and occasional off-spinner.

HARDIKAR, MANOHAR SHANKAR, who died on February 4, 1995, in Bombay, aged 58, was an all-rounder who played two Tests for India against West Indies in 1958-59. On his debut in Bombay, he took his only Test wicket ( Kanhai, lbw) with his third ball and then helped save the game with 32 not out, having been out first ball in the first innings. In the next match at Kanpur, he was hit on the head, which badly affected his confidence. However, he remained a highly effective all-rounder for Bombay. He made his debut for them aged only 18 in 1955-56 and his slow to medium-paced bowling had its greatest day when he took eight for 39 against Bengal in the final of the Ranji Trophy that season. He played 14 seasons in all, captaining Bombay in the last two, and scored eight centuries, including 207 not out against Services in 1964-65.

HARVEY, MERVYN ROYE, who died on March 20, 1995, aged 76, was the eldest of four brothers who all played first-class circket for Victoria. The most famous, Neil, said that Merv was the most talented of the four. Merv Harvey was a free-scoring right-handed opening bat whose opportunities were severely restricted by the war. When it ended he was 27, but he got his chance against England in 1946-47. After scoring a three-hour 136 for Victoria against New South Wales, he was picked for the Adelaide Test in place of the injured Sid Barnes. He did quite well, though not in his normal style, and scored 31 in the second innings, sharing a stand of 116 with Arthur Morris, who was on his way to his second hundred of the match. That was not enough for Harvey to keep his place. In 22 first-class matches he hit 1,147 runs at 38.23 with three centuries. He captained Victoria five times.

HENDERSON, WILLIAM ANDREW, who died on March 6, 1995, aged 77, was a South African fast bowler and one of only three men (along with Bill Copson and Pat Pocock) ever to take five wickets in six balls in first-class cricket. It happened in a Currie Cup match for North-Eastern Transvaal against Orange Free State at Bloemfontein in February 1938. Henderson had figures of 9.3-7-4-7, including four wickets in four balls. Free State were all out for 46.

HIDE, MARY EDITH, died in hospital on September 10, 1995, aged 81. Molly Hide was a farmer's daughter from Surrey (though she was born in Shanghai) who became one of the great pioneers of women's cricket in England. She played in the first ever women's Test in Brisbane in December 1934 and was England captain for 17 years. Tall and lithe, she could drive the ball beautifully, but her batting had a strength as well as a style that astonished sceptical male spectators, many of whom in her era thought women's cricket was like a dog on its hind legs. Her first great triumph came after the 1934-35 tour moved on to New Zealand, when she scored a century in the Christchurch Test, putting on 235 with Betty Snowball. England declared at 503 for five-- New Zealand had been bowled out for 44, and lost by an innings and 337. She became captain for the home series against Australia two years later and held the post until her retirement in 1954. She would have missed the 1939-40 tour of Australia because her parents persuaded her to stay on the farm and not go gallivanting. But the tour was cancelled anyway, and when it finally took place nine years later she scored five centuries, including 124 not out at the Sydney Cricket Ground, and her portrait was hung in the pavilion. In 15 Tests she scored 872 runs at 36.33, and took 36 wickets at 15.25, with the slowish off-cutters that she bowled only reluctantly. Her captaincy was firm, even stern, and she remained in touch with the game, as a selector and, in 1973, president of the Women's Cricket Association. Molly Hide also played lacrosse for England. She was something of a Joan Hunter Dunn figure but more than that, as Netta Rheinberg said, she was the personification of women's cricket, doing an immense amount to give the game credibility.

HILL, WILLIAM AUBREY, who died on August 11, 1995, aged 85, was the last surviving Warwickshire player from the 1920s. Aubrey Hill was an opening batsman who played 169 times between 1929 and 1948 without ever being sure of his place. Though he was capped in 1933, he did not score his maiden century until 1936 and his best season came when he made 1,197 runs in 1947. After retiring he coached Oxford University.

HOLLINSHEAD, CYRIL, who died on November 25, 1995, aged 93, played his last cricket match in 1992 when he bowled six overs costing 16 runs for the Gloucestershire Gipsies, aged 90. This was the culmination of a life in which a love for cricket bordered on addiction. Hollinshead took 4,000 wickets in club matches as a left-arm bowler, fast in his day, over a span that began in 1911, 81 years before its conclusion. He made one first-class appearance, for Gloucestershire against Cambridge University in 1946. Between matches he edited the Cheltenham evening paper, the Gloucestershire Echo, from 1938 to 1967.

HOME OF THE HIRSEL, The Baron, KT, PC, who died at his home on October 9, 1995, aged 92, was the only British prime minister to have played first-class cricket. As Lord Dunglass, he was a useful member of the Eton XI. In the rain-affected Eton- Harrow match of 1922 he scored 66, despite being hindered by a saturated outfield, and then took four for 37 with his medium-paced out-swingers. He played ten first-class matches for six different teams: Middlesex, Oxford University, H. D. G. Leveson Gower's XI, MCC (with whom he toured South America under Pelham Warner), Free Foresters and Harlequins. His two games for Middlesex were in 1924 and 1925, both against Oxford University while he was actually an Oxford undergraduate; he did not represent the university until the following year. His cricket was gradually overtaken by politics, and he entered the Commons in 1931. After he succeeded to his father's title and became the 14th Earl of Home, he rose to be foreign secretary and then prime minister, when he emerged as a totally unexpected compromise choice as Harold Macmillan's successor. After renouncing his title (and becoming Sir Alec Douglas-Home until he returned to the Lords as a life peer) he remained in Downing Street for a year until the 1964 election. Despite all his honours, Alec Home never made an enemy and was much valued, in cricket as in politics, for his quiet charm and sagacity. He was president of MCC in 1966 and an important behind-the-scenes influence whenever the game was in difficulties. From 1977 to 1989 Lord Home was Governor of I Zingari. The general opinion is that, even if he had devoted himself to the game, he would not have been a regular county player, but then no one expected him to rise so high in politics either. H. S. Altham, in his review of public schools cricket in the 1923 Wisden, said Lord Dunglass was a better batsman on wet pitches-- he had the courage of his convictions and could hook and pull the turning ball effectively. Much the same could be said for his politics: he was always at his best on a sticky wicket.

HUDLESTON, Air chief marshal Sir EDMUND CUTHBERT, CBE CB, KCB, GCB, who died on December 14, 1994, aged 85, played four first-class matches as a wicket-keeper/batsman for the RAF in 1929 and 1931. Hudleston was Commander-in-Chief, Allied Forces, Central Europe from 1964 to 1965.

HUDSON, Brig. REGINALD EUSTACE HAMILTON, DSO, who died on May 26, 1995, aged 90, was perhaps the best Services batsman of the inter-war period. He averaged 40.15 in 27 first-class matches for the Army and the Europeans in India, scoring five first-class centuries, including 217 in 225 minutes for the Army against the RAF at The Oval in 1932, the second hundred coming in 70 minutes. Wisden described his form as brilliant. He scored 181 against the 1933 West Indians but was out for four when he and Bradman were opposing captains in the match against the Australians a year later. He won the DSO as commander of the 83rd Field Regiment, which he led from 1942 until VE Day. The new pavilion on the Royal Artillery ground at Woolwich is named after him.

INGELSE, DANIËL LODEWIJK, who died on June 1995, aged 77, was the first Dutchman to make a century against Denmark, in 1955.

Inshan Ali, who died from throat cancer on June 24, 1995, aged 45, was a back-of-the-hand slow left-arm bowler who played in 12 Tests for West Indies in the 1970s. He was a slight figure who looked increasingly out of place in the team as the emphasis switched to non-stop fast bowling, and his inability to translate his first-class form to Test level was one of the factors that encouraged West Indies to transform their game. Inshan's 34 Test wickets cost 47.67, and he had limited success after taking five for 59 against New Zealand at Port-of-Spain in 1971-72. He made his debut for Trinidad aged only 16 and his unusual methods frequently troubled batsmen below top level. He had returned to playing club cricket in Trinidad shortly before his fatal illness.

JACQUES, THOMAS ALEC, died on February 23, 1995, aged 90. Sandy Jacques was said by Sir Len Hutton to have had the finest fast bowling action he had ever seen but what might have been a famous career was curtailed by injury. Jacques made his debut for Yorkshire in 1927 and after only six matches was taking four for 53 in a Test trial at Lord's. His ability to maintain pace and length for long periods impressed observers and he turned professional, amid high expectations, the following year. But it became clear that his legs could not stand the strain of cricket six days a week; he even tried wearing five pairs of socks to try and lessen the pain. Thereafter, he appeared only intermittently, and devoted himself to League cricket, in which he was a demon, and his farm at Cliffe, near Selby, where he lived all his life. Jacques played 30 first-class matches in all, 28 for Yorkshire, and never finished on the losing side.

JAYASINGHE, SUNIL ASOKA, who died on April 20, 1995, aged 39, was Sri Lanka's wicket-keeper in the 1979 World Cup, and scored half-centuries against Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire on tour that summer. Before it was first-class, he scored 283 for Bloomfield in the P. Saravanamuttu Tournament. Jayasinghe reportedly poisoned himself while suffering from depression.

JENKINS, ROLAND OLIVER, died on July 21, 1995, aged 76. Roly Jenkins was one of the most popular, and skilful, county cricketers of the years just after the war. He will forever be associated with long afternoons at Worcester, running up to bowl his leg-breaks in his cap (though he batted without one) with a seaman's gait (though his furthest posting during the war was fire-watching at the top of Worcester Cathedral) and punctuating the game with a very mellow sort of humour. However, he was a fundamentally serious cricketer, indeed almost obsessive. He played nine Tests, but in the end his career may have been damaged by his constant search for perfection--as well as his propensity to make remarks that were not always appreciated by starchy authority.

Jenkins was the youngest of a family of ten, and was spotted playing in a knockabout on Worcester Racecourse. He made his debut in 1938, was capped in 1939 and, when cricket resumed, established himself as a gutsy middle-order batsman as well as a fierce spinner of the ball. He finished the 1948 season with 1,356 runs and 88 wickets and was just finalising plans for his wedding when he received a telegram asking him to replace Eric Hollies in the touring party for South Africa. The wedding was postponed and he had a hugely successful tour, dismissing Eric Rowan with his third ball in Test cricket, and topping the England bowling averages for the series. However, Jenkins did not play against New Zealand the following summer, though he took 183 wickets (including two hat-tricks in one match, against Surrey) and scored 1,183 runs: he may have made an ill-advised remark to someone important. Once, while batting with his captain, Bob Wyatt, who was alleged to be rather disdainful about calling, he said: Say something, even if it's only goodbye. I'll see you at lunch, Jenkins, came the stern reply.

Jenkins is said to have changed his grip after he came back from South Africa and switched to something more normal for a seamer; previously, he had been ripping both his fingers and the ball. But even after this change he still turned the ball prodigiously, possibly as much as Shane Warne, though at a slower pace. His googly was comparatively easy to pick: asked how many of the 183 victims in 1949 came through googlies, he replied: About 14--and they were all jazzhats. But he continued taking large quantities of wickets, was recalled by England in both 1950 and 1952, when he did the double again, and remained a force in county cricket until he retired in 1958. Still he worried constantly about his bowling. He was sometimes spotted in the nets at 7 a.m. and once remarked to Eric Hollies after he bowled Warwickshire out: But I can't hear it fizzing. I shouldn't worry about it, Roly, said Hollies. Six of our blokes did. Tony Lewis said he was bowled out in Worcester by a ball that pitched in Hereford. Jenkins played on in the Birmingham League as the pro for West Bromwich Dartmouth until his mid-fifties. By then, he was a revered figure and one umpire insisted on letting him deliver a ten-ball over for the sheer pleasure of watching him bowl. He ran his own sweet shop next to Worcester bus station, before they moved the bus station and trade declined. Then he took a job as foreman in a canning factory. A manager once asked him why he was wearing two coats. I'm doing two men's jobs. he told them, twinklingly, but pointedly all the same. For some years, he umpired village matches for Ombersley--and coached as he did so. He never lost his love of cricket, or cricket talk. We're given memories so we can have roses in December, he once said.

JONES, HARRY OGWYN, who died on March 20, 1995, aged 72, was a seam bowler and appeared in two matches for Glamorgan in 1946. He played most of his cricket for Llangennech.

KELLEHER, DANIEL JOHN MICHAEL, was found dead at his home on December 12, 1995, aged 29. It was reported that a note was by the body. Danny Kelleher was a popular and extrovert medium-pacer who played 34 matches for Kent between 1987 and 1991 without firmly establishing himself. He was later engaged on a match basis for Surrey but failed to reach the first team. His uncle, Harry Kelleher, played for Surrey and Northamptonshire.

KIDSON, HAYWARD CARY, died in hospital on April 26, 1995, aged 69, after undergoing his eighth hip operation. Kidson was South Africa's leading umpire in the period before isolation. He stood in 11 Test matches, including four on England's 1964-65 tour and all five of the series of matches against Australia two years later, when the Australians, heading for defeat, were inclined to blame him. He was an expert on the laws and a historian of the game.

LAMBERT, HENRY FRANCIS, who died in Adelaide on June 19, 1995, aged 77, was a left-arm fast-medium bowler for Victoria. In 33 first-class matches Harry Lambert took 76 wickets, 29 of them on the Commonwealth XI tour of India in 1949-50. He spent two seasons as professional for Ramsbottom in the Lancashire League.

LARWOOD, HAROLD, MBE, who died in hospital in Sydney on July 22, 1995, aged 90, was one of the great fast bowlers of all time. This will forever be overshadowed by his role in the cricketing controversy of the century, the Bodyline Affair. It is a dispute that retains its extraordinary potency even though nearly all the participants are now dead. It came close to rupturing cricket; indeed, it might have ruptured relations between Britain and Australia. But it was in the nature of cricket that Larwood should eventually settle happily in Australia, the country whose batsmen he once haunted.

Harold Larwood was a miner's son from Nuncargate outside Nottingham. He left school at 13; at 14 he was working with the pit ponies at Annesley Colliery near Nottingham and would doubtless have become a miner himself had he not already been showing promise at cricket; at 18 he had a trial at Trent Bridge. This was the classic instance of a county whistling down the nearest coal mine when they wanted a fast bowler. In 1924, at 19, Larwood was starring in the Second Eleven and making his Nottinghamshire debut; in 1925 he was a first-team regular; in 1926 he was in the England team at Lord's and, more significantly, the one that regained the Ashes at The Oval. In that match he took six wickets, all front-line batsmen, and consistently troubled everyone with pace and lift from short of a length. The word was already going round that Lol Larwood was the quickest bowler seen in years. In 1927 he came top of the national averages. By 1928 he was in harness with the left-armer Bill Voce and together they would become the world's most feared pair of opening bowlers.

Larwood began the 1928-29 series in Australia with a match-winning six for 32 on the old Exhibition Ground in Brisbane (in addition to scoring 70). The only batsman in the top seven that he did not get out in that match was the debutant D. G. Bradman and, though England comfortably retained the Ashes, Bradman asserted his authority as the series progressed. By the time he came to England in 1930, he was almost unassailable. Larwood played only three of the Tests that summer, and took just four wickets. Australia regained the Ashes. The combination of shirt-front wickets and the greatest batsman of all time was enough to break the spirit of any bowler. Larwood's urge to find something, anything, that would enable him to defeat Bradman, was crucial in rendering him a willing instrument in the crisis that was to come.

Bodyline, or leg-theory bowling, with bowlers aiming at the body with a ring of predatory leg-side fielders, was not unknown at this stage; Arthur Carr, the Nottinghamshire captain, would sometimes unleash Larwood in that manner in county matches. Several batsmen were carried off unconscious after being hit by Larwood even when he was bowling normally. Carr used Bodyline as a tactic. Douglas Jardine, who led England in Australia in 1932-33, elevated it into a strategy. But Larwood was not just his dupe. The game had become so biased in favour of the batsmen, there was no pressure on them at all, he said in 1983. If we got four wickets down in a day, we'd done a good day's work. If we got five we had an extra drink. Our way was the only way to quieten Bradman. I knew that if we eased up, we'd have to pay for it.

The controversy reached boiling point in the Adelaide Test when Larwood hit Bill Woodfull over the heart and Bert Oldfield over the temple. Larwood again the unlucky bowler, as the newsreel commentator famously said. It was the feeling that Larwood, far from being unlucky, had achieved his side's objectives by inflicting injury that incensed the Australians. However, when he made 98 as a night-watchman in the final Test in Sydney he was, according to Wisden, loudly cheered.

Larwood damaged his foot while bowling in that match, though Jardine made him stay on the field until Bradman was out. The foot injury meant he could bowl only ten overs in the 1933 season, and by the time the Australians came to England in 1934 the full implications of Bodyline had sunk in. A combination of poor communications, inadequate newspaper coverage and imperial arrogance, especially at Lord's, had prevented English cricket understanding immediately what had been going on in Australia. But once opinion had changed, Larwood is understood to have been given a letter of apology and told to sign. He refused and never played another Test match, alienating MCC once and for all by giving frank opinions on the subject to the Sunday Express. At the time he paid the penalty rather than Jardine, who captained MCC again in India in 1933-34. History has reversed the judgment, and Jardine is usually painted as the villain. Larwood's loyalty to his skipper remained unshaken until he died.

He continued to play county cricket to devastating effect and topped the national averages for the fifth time in 1936, two years before he finally retired. Bodyline had almost disappeared after Jardine's tour and was formally outlawed two years later. Larwood, though, was good enough, even if he was slowing down, to achieve success without it. He was only about 5ft 8in, less than 11 stone, and his training regime seemed to consist largely of beer and cigarettes. But he was stocky, and his technique was magnificent: He ran in to bowl with a splendid stride, wrote Neville Cardus, a gallop, and at the moment of delivery his action was absolutely classical, left side showing down the wicket, before the arm swung over with a thrillingly vehement rhythm. Later generations, observing only a few newsreel clips, have wondered whether Larwood threw; contemporary critics echoed the Cardus line--and in any case his Australian victims might just have raised the subject if there was any doubt at all. His bouncer was truly terrifying to unprotected batsmen, but it was employed only sparingly for most of his career. Of his 1,427 first-class wickets, more than half--743--were bowled. Larwood's average was 17.51, which was outstanding in a batsman's era; in his 21 Tests he took 78 at 28.35. His batting average was close to 20, and he scored three centuries.

After retirement, he went into eclipse and was living in Blackpool with his wife and five daughters, running a sweet shop, when he decided to emigrate to Australia. In 1949, he sailed on the Orontes, the ship which had taken him there, more famously, 17 years earlier. Encouraged by a former opponent, Jack Fingleton, and helped by a former Australian prime minister, Ben Chifley, Larwood settled in an obscure Sydney suburb, got a job on the Pepsi-Cola production line, and worked his way up-- not because I was a cricketer but because I could do the job--to managing the lorry fleet.

It was possible to hear the noise of the Sydney Cricket Ground from his bungalow when the wind was right, and it became a place of pilgrimage for visiting Englishmen with a sense of history; Darren Gough delighted the old man by calling there in 1994-95. By then Larwood was blind, and long before that visitors were baffled by the idea that this shy, stooped, kindly man could ever have terrorised cricket. There as never a hint of animosity in Australia, and Larwood had no regrets either, although he repented of his old view that Bradman was frightened of him. I realise now he was working out ways of combating me. John Major signalled the British Establishment's forgiveness by awarding him the MBE in 1993. Larwood was most proud of the ashtray given him by Jardine: To Harold for the Ashes--1932-33--From a grateful Skipper.

A special article appears on pages 31-33.

LAVERS, ALAN BRADEN, who died on October 25, 1995, aged 83, was an amateur who made 25 appearances for Essex between 1937 and 1953, as a batsman and off-spinner.

LEADER, JOHN VERNON, died on March 22, 1995, aged 86. Vern Leader was a left-hand bat and right-arm seam bowler who played irregularly for Otago between 1928-29 and 1940-41. He was a member of the team that won the Plunket Shield in 1932-33.

LEVETT, WILLIAM HOWARD VINCENT, died on November 30, 1995, aged 87. Howard Hopper Levett was in the great tradition of Kent wicket-keepers but his first-class career was hampered not only by the war but by the presence at Kent of the great Les Ames. However, he was brave and fearless and a genuine stumper--195 of his 478 dismissals (in 175 matches) were stumpings--who stood up to almost everyone, and was good enough to win a Test cap in Calcutta in 1933-34. Hopper (the nickname reputedly came from his hop farm) was as famous as a character as a player. He supposedly emerged one morning, after a heavy night, to let the first ball through for four byes then dived to take a brilliant leg-side catch next ball. Not bad for the first ball of the day, he said. He is also supposed to have bowled a bread roll when the 1938 Australians went in at Canterbury needing seven to win. After retirement in 1947, he became Kent's staunchest supporter, happily traveling to Second Eleven matches as a committee man to encourage young players. He had opinions on everyone in cricket, but they were always kindly expressed and secondary to his fund of stories. He was a magnificent talker, after dinner or at any other time, and was probably the most popular man in Kent.

LITTLE, RAYMOND CECIL JAMES, OAM, who died on April 28, 1995, aged 79, played in eight matches for New South Wales in 1934-35 and 1935-36; he was out for a king pair in his first match but later scored 360 runs at 24.00. He also made a powerful 117 against the 1932-33 MCC team, but this came for Northern New South Wales in the non-first-class match at Newcastle. Ray Little was a well-liked cricket administrator for more than 30 years, culminating in seven years on the Australian Cricket Board up to 1979.

LOCK, GRAHAM ANTHONY RICHARD, died on March 29, 1995, aged 65, in Perth, Western Australia where, in the 1960s, he enjoyed a career as rewarding as that pursued throughout the previous decade for Surrey and England. Tony Lock was an aggressive, attacking left-arm spinner, who complemented ideally the subtleties of Jim Laker's off-spin when Surrey were winning the County Championship every year from 1952 to 1958 and England regained, then retained, the Ashes; their names were twinned in cricket lore in a way usually associated with opening batsmen and fast bowlers. The final phase of his playing days saw him as a more orthodox slow bowler, relying on guile and flight as much as spin, and as a driving captain of Western Australia and Leicestershire.

Recommended to Surrey by H. D. G. Leveson Gower, Lock made his Championship debut in 1946, a week after his 17th birthday, against Kent at The Oval, and marked it with a hot catch at backward short leg off Alf Gover--the first of 830 in his career. In 1948, while doing National Service, he took six for 43 at Pontypridd, on a pitch that afforded little assistance to bowlers, when the Combined Services beat Glamorgan, that summer's champions, and back at The Oval in 1949 he ousted the recently capped South Australian, John McMahon, as the left-arm spinner. Next year, when Surrey shared the Championship with Lancashire, his contribution was 72 wickets at 22.38 and his reward--belatedly in his opinion--was his county cap. In 1951 he took 100 wickets for the first time. But the 1952 Wisden said he would struggle to gain higher honours unless he imparts more spin to his leg-break. After two winters working at an indoor school in Croydon, he emerged with a lower trajectory that produced vicious spin at around medium-pace. Now the ball spat from leg stump to hit the top of the off, or spun devilishly and jumped shoulder high. Gone were his original high-arm action and the classical spin bowler's loop, victims, it was said, of a low beam in those Croydon nets that had forced him to drop his arm. His new method was far more effective but produced mutterings about its legitimacy. In 1952 he was called up for the Old Trafford Test against India, and took four for 36 in the second innings. But a week later, when Surrey played the tourists at The Oval, he was no-balled three times in two overs for throwing his quicker ball. Raising the beam at the Croydon nets helped restore something of Lock's original action, but he was again called for throwing in the West Indies in 1953-54 and for a time he refrained from bowling his faster ball. It was this delivery which drew the legendary lament from Doug Insole, the Essex captain, to the square-leg umpire when he was bowled by Lock in fading light: How was I out then--run out?

Although picked for the First Test against Australia in 1953, he wore his spinning finger raw the day after selection and played in only the last two Tests. At Headingley, his resolute batting served England better than his bowling, but at The Oval his return of 21-9-45-5 on the third afternoon, along with Laker's four for 75, was instrumental in Australia's dismissal for 162. Next day, England regained the Ashes for the first time since 1932-33, and in the spring Wisden named him as one of the Five Cricketers of the Year.

It was a different story at Old Trafford in 1956, when Laker took 19 Australian wickets while Lock had to be content with the left-over, and economical match figures of one for 106 from 69 overs. He had enjoyed his own ten-wicket return three weeks earlier. After taking six for 29 in Kent's first innings at Blackheath, he demolished their second innings with figures of 29.1-18-54-10. In 1957 he had a match return of 11 for 48 from 37.4 overs in the Oval Test against West Indies, and in the wet summer of 1958 he was utterly ruthless against the weak New Zealanders, taking 34 wickets at just 7.47 apiece.

On overseas tours, he was not quite the same threat, except on the soft pitches of New Zealand in 1958-59. There he took 13 Test wickets at less than nine apiece, but also saw himself on film, and was genuinely shocked by the imperfection of his action. Had I known I was throwing I wouldn't have bowled that way, he said later. So he remodelled his action once more, but he still took his 100 wickets every year until 1962, his penultimate year at The Oval. He was no longer such a fearsome proposition in England but emerged as a better bowler overseas. He was the leading wicket-taker on MCC's tour of India and Pakistan in 1961-62 and, when he was omitted from the side for Australia in 1962-63, he went instead to play for Western Australia, where he took 32 wickets in the Sheffield Shield and immediately became a fixture. In 1966-67, he was the first post-war bowler to take 50 or more Shield wickets in a season. He assumed the captaincy in 1967-68 and led Western Australia to only their second Shield. Meanwhile, he had been recruited by Leicestershire for mid-week games in 1965, and captained them in the next two seasons with such infectious enthusiasm that they rose from 14th in 1965 to second in 1967, then their highest position in the Championship.

There was an unexpected twist to this phase of his career when he was called to the Caribbean to replace the injured Titmus in 1967-68 and played in the last two Tests. In the final one, at Georgetown, his belligerent 89 in England's first innings surpassed his previous highest first-class score, and put England on course for the draw that gave them the series. He was, Trevor Bailey wrote, the ideal person to walk out to the crease when the match seemed lost.

Lock continued as a coach in Perth and from 1987 to 1991 was cricket professional at Mill Hill School in north London. His final years were overshadowed by two allegations of sexual abuse involving young girls, the second only months before his death from cancer. Cleared of both charges, he was nevertheless forced to sell some of his cricket memorabilia to meet his legal costs, and while the second court case was pending his wife died of a heart attack. He said bitterly just before he died that he would be remembered only for the charges and not for his cricket, but he will be proved wrong. There never has been a more aggressive spin bowler, wrote David Frith in The Slow Men, and the aggression came out in his captaincy, his famous full-throated appealing ( When Lock appeals at The Oval, as the old joke said, someone's out at Lord's.) and his marvellous catching. The spectacular ones, the sudden full-length dives, were the easy ones, recalled his Surrey team-mate Micky Stewart. His best were when he took the rockets, close in, without anyone noticing. Only W. G. Grace and Frank Woolley have taken more catches. Lock is also ninth in the list of all-time wicket takers with 2,844 at 19.23; 174 of those came in his 49 Tests, at 25.58. He was a volatile, vulnerable man but he was an astonishingly durable cricketer and the memory of that will endure too.

MALCOLM, HENRY JOHN JAMES, who died on January 6, 1995, aged 80, made 76 not out on his first-class debut for Middlesex against Cambridge University in 1948. He played only three more matches, but was an outstanding club batsman and medium-pace bowler for South Hampstead, and scored 105 not out for the Club Cricket Conference against the 1949 New Zealanders.

MALLETT, ANTHONY WILLIAM HAWARD, died in Cape Town on December 10, 1994, aged 70. Tony Mallett was an outstanding schoolboy player alongside Trevor Bailey at Dulwich, and an Oxford Blue in 1947 and 1948. He then became a schoolteacher and appeared irregularly for Kent--33 matches between 1946 and 1953--mostly during the holidays. When he played, he performed with gusto. His highest score, 97 against Sussex at Tunbridge Wells in 1946, was made in only 68 minutes. He bowled at a rapid pace and took six for 42 playing for the South against a strong North team in 1948. He emigrated to Southern Africa in 1957 and for 18 years was principal of Diocesan College, Cape Town. His son Nick, also an Oxford cricket Blue, played rugby for South Africa.

MAMA, BAPOO BURJORJI, who died on March 18, 1995, aged 71, was one of India's leading statisticians. He kept cricket records for almost 50 years and was a member of the Indian TV commentary team from 1973 to 1988.

MANSELL, PERCY NEVILLE FRANK, MBE, who died on May 9, 1995, aged 75, was one of the handful of Rhodesian cricketers to play for South Africa. Slightly built and bespectacled, he probably looked more at home in his other role--accountancy--than cricket. But he was a tennis champion as well as a cricketer and was a remarkable all-round player: forceful batsman, safe slip, skilful leg spinner and, in emergency, a seamer as well. Mansell was born in Shropshire, but the family was already settled in Rhodesia and his mother took him back there as a baby. As a 16-year-old he played for Rhodesia against Transvaal and two years later scored 62 against MCC in Bulawayo in February 1939. He did not get a chance in Test cricket until picked to go to England in 1951. Brought in to bat at No. 7 for the Leeds Test, he got to 90 but, with the last man in, he was forced to attack and was caught at mid-on. It was the highest score of a generally disappointing tour (though he did bowl Freddie Brown, playing for MCC, with his first-ever ball at Lord's) and of his 13 Tests. But the following season, he became the second man, after A. E. E. Vogler, to do the 500 run/50 wicket double in a South African season. He was a member of the vibrant 1952-53 party to Australia, and returned to England in 1955, playing in four Tests with very little success. Mansell played his last first-class match in 1961-62, before retiring with a record of 4,598 runs at 29.66, 299 wickets at 26.08, and 156 catches in only 113 matches. In Tests he scored 355 runs at 17.75 and took 11 wickets at 66.90. On retirement, he was awarded the MBE for services for cricket and made a Freeman of Bulawayo. He was not a man for personal glory, though. In Rhodesia, he is reputed to have got into a situation where he needed to score two for victory and three for his century; he happily settled for the two.

MARLEY, ROBERT CECIL, who died in Florida on May 13, 1995, aged 85, was an opening batsman who captained Jamaica in one match in 1945-46. He later became a successful lawyer and a leading cricket administrator, serving as president of the West Indies Cricket Board of Control from 1971 to 1974.

MARSHALL, OLIVE, died in hospital in March 1995, aged 62. Polly Marshall was a stalwart of women's cricket in Yorkshire, whom she captained for many years. She played 13 Tests for England between 1954 and 1966, batting, bowling medium-paced and fielding magnificently: she once effected three run outs in an innings at Auckland.

MIRZA, PARVAZ, who was found dead from natural causes at his home in Birmingham on September 24, 1995, aged 24, was a promising fast-medium bowler with Worcestershire. It is understood he had a heart condition, though this had not been regarded as a serious problem. He had played in seven Championship matches since his debut in 1994 and firmly established himself in the Sunday League side. The week before his death he was in the team for the match against Glamorgan that could have given Worcestershire the Sunday title. Mirza was a whippy bowler, willing to experiment, and was working on a useful fast off-break. He had delighted spectators by his fighting performance with the bat to save the match against Derbyshire at Kidderminster. He was quiet, very popular, and absolutely thrilled to be playing county cricket, said Worcestershire secretary Mike Vockins.

MITCHELL, BRUCE, who died on July 1, 1995, aged 86, appeared for South Africa in all 42 Tests they played between 1929 and 1949. He nearly always opened the innings and acquired a reputation throughout the game as a dour and boring batsman. The sad but brutal truth, wrote E. W. Swanton in 1949, after the last of his eight Test centuries, is that any Test in which this ultra-patient cricketer makes a hundred is almost sure to end in a draw. This was not literally true: Mitchell's most famous innings was the unbeaten 164 that gave South Africa their Test victory in England, at Lord's in 1935. But even he used to joke that he was not sure how he had time to make the runs, since the match lasted only three days.

The old-time South African wicket-keeper E. A. Halliwell is reputed to have predicted that Mitchell would play for South Africa when he coached him as a six-year-old, and he was immensely successful as a Johannesburg schoolboy. But he went into the Transvaal team as a 17-year-old for his bowling, and took five for 23 and six for 72 with his leg-breaks on his debut against Border. However, Mitchell soon worked his way up the batting order, and his bowling became more occasional. Aged 20, having played only one match on turf in his life, he was picked to tour England in 1929. He began the tour at No. 7, but the captain, H. G. Deane, chose him to open in the First Test at Edgbaston. Mitchell batted for seven hours, scoring 88, in the first innings. Even Wisden said the cricket was uninteresting and the innings featureless. He was in for a further two hours 35 minutes in the second innings, this time making 61 not out. By then the game was already doomed to be drawn, but Mitchell had made himself as much of an immovable fixture in the team as he was at the crease. His form fell away that series, to the relief of both opposition and spectators. But he topped the South African averages in the home series against England in 1930-31, scoring his maiden Test century in their first ever home Test on turf, at Cape Town, when he began the match with a stand of 260 with Jack Siedle that remains a South African first-wicket Test record. In Australia a year later, he was ill but still played in every Test and emerged as a brilliant slip fielder, taking six catches in the Third Test. Unfortunately, in the First Test, he put down Bradman on 15; it was supposedly the only time Mitchell had ever been heard to swear. Bradman went on to score 226.

Mitchell was the leading bowler in the 1934-35 Currie Cup, but when he came to England the following summer resumed his role as the linchpin of the batting. His great innings, which remains the highest for South Africa at Lord's, took five and a half hours and he off-drove beautifully to give his team-mate Xenophon Balaskas time to bowl England out. Mitchell was criticized in the last two Tests when South Africa successfully sat on their lead and squashed the series; he spent three and threequarter hours over 48--a return to his form in Brisbane three years earlier when he went 70 minutes without scoring--at Manchester, and scored a risk-free hundred at The Oval. He struggled with the bat in the home series against Australia that followed too quickly after the tour of England, though he took some important wickets, and he returned to his best form before England toured in 1938-39. The Durban Timeless Test might have been made for him, though his second-innings 89 actually occupied less than four hours of the ten days.

Mitchell served with the Transvaal Scottish Regiment in the war, and was still South Africa's best batsman when he returned in 1947, scoring 120 and 189 not out at The Oval, batting for more than 13 hours and spending less than 15 minutes of the match off the field. He finished the 1948-49 series against England almost as strongly, with 99 and 56 in the last Test, and no one imagined that he would never play for South Africa again. But he was dropped, amid general astonishment, after failing in two preliminary matches against the 1949-50 Australians, and he retired at once. He remains South Africa's leading Test run-scorer, with 3,471 at 48.88. Mitchell was a quiet, modest man with a self deprecating sense of humour. At his home he kept a cartoon that recalled not his triumphs but one of his rare failures: it showed a lone figure banished to a desert island and was captioned The Man Who Dropped Bradman. And he would chucklingly recall the spectator at Edgbaston in 1929 who, having watched him bat, asked him if he thought he was a war memorial.

MORRISBY, RONALD ORLANDO GEORGE, who died on June 10, 1995, aged 80, was Tasmania's leading run-getter in the days before the state was elevated to the Sheffield Shield. He made his first-class debut, against Victoria on Christmas Day 1931, 18 days before his 17th birthday, and went on to make 2,596 first-class runs as a back-foot opening batsman. He toured India with Frank Tarrant's team in 1935-36, and played in a Test trial at Sydney the following season.

MURRAY, ANTON RONALD ANDREW, who died on April 17, 1995, aged 72, after a long illness, played ten Test matches for South Africa as an all-rounder. He was a vigorous right-handed batsman, an accurate medium-paced stock bowler, and one of the most athletic members of the brilliant fielding team that toured Australia in 1952-53. He played four Tests, missing the Fourth because of appendicitis, the after-effects of which hampered him on his return; but his 51 in the Second Test was vital in helping put South Africa into position for their first win over Australia in 42 years. His only Test century came later that tour, at Wellington. He scored 109 and his seventh-wicket partnership of 246 with Jackie McGlew was then a world Test record. He toured England in 1955 but did not make the Test team. Murray played for Eastern Province from 1947-48 to 1955-56. He was a schoolteacher and founder of St Alban's College in Pretoria.

MURRAY-WILLIS, PETER EARNSHAW, who died on January 7, 1995, aged 84, was a brave and spirited cricketer who played briefly for Worcestershire before the war and was appointed captain of Northamptonshire in the confusion of 1946. Having helped organise wartime matches for the club, he was chosen in the hope that he would be an approximation of the county's popular pre-war captain, Robert Nelson, his school friend from St George's, Harpenden, who had been killed in the war. His appointment was not a success; there was criticism of his tactics and Murray-Willis's reputation failed to recover from the time his cap blew off while he was chasing the ball to the boundary, and he stopped to get the cap before returning for the ball--the batsmen were laughing too much to take advantage. He was obliged to resign in mid-season, and left the county game. But he continued playing club cricket until he was in his mid-fifties.

MUSSON, Maj.-Gen. ALFRED HENRY, CB, CBE, who died on August 6, 1995, aged 94, played for the Army against Cambridge University at Fenner's in 1925. His tow brothers also played first-class cricket.

NORFOLK, LAVINIA, DUCHESS OF, who died on December 10, 1995, aged 79, was widow of the cricket-loving 16th Duke and enthusiastically developed the game at Arundel Castle, although she was personally more of a racing fan. Her daughter Lady Herries is married to Sir Colin Cowdrey.

PARKER, GRAHAME WILSHAW, OBE, who died on November 11, 1995, aged 83, was closely associated with Gloucestershire as player, administrator and historian, but was also one of the Renaissance men of English sport. It is said he came into cricket by fluke: at Cambridge he turned his back on the game but was pursued by the captain, on his bicycle, to fill a gap against Nottinghamshire. He agreed and scored 96 against Larwood and Voce. He went on to win a Blue that year and in 1935, when he was captain. Parker was already a rugby Blue and went on to win two England caps as a full-back; he was also offered professional terms by Gloucester City soccer club. He only played 70 cricket matches for Gloucestershire, being restricted by schoolteaching duties. But he was an attractive batsman, who made 210 in four hours against Kent at Dover in 1937. He was also a useful swing bowler and an athletic fielder. In the war he rose to the rank of major and then became a legendary figure at Blundell's School, where he was a housemaster for 15 years. In 1968 he left teaching to become Gloucestershire secretary, doing the job for eight years and helping revitalise the club. He was not just a games player, said Tony Brown, then the county captain, but a man of vision and ideas.

POWELL, LOUIS ST VINCENT, who died on June 6, 1995, aged 92, made ten appearances as one of Somerset's many amateurs at intervals between 1927 and 1938. He was an opening bowler who found himself forced to face Ted McDonald in full cry when he went out to bat No. 10 in his first match: the senior pro Tom Young noticed his pads were not good enough, loaned him his and Powell made 22. He played rugby for Bath and Somerset.

PRESTON, STEPHEN, who died on June 30, 1995, aged 89, was a medium-pace bowler who played five times between 1928 and 1930 for the strong Lancashire team, opening the attack with Ted McDonald on his debut.

RAO, Maj.-Gen. JOGINDER SINGH, died on October 3, 1994, aged 56. In 1963-64, he performed the hat-trick on his first-class debut, a feat achieved by only eight men in history. Five days later he took two hat-tricks in the second innings of his next match: he finished with seven for 30. Three hat-tricks in a player's first two matches is not merely unequalled; it may never be equalled. Rao was a fast-medium bowler, who was representing Services in the Ranji Trophy. His cricketing career was subsequently superseded by his military one; he served in the 1965 and 1971 wars against Pakistan.

RICHARDSON, JAMES VERE, who died on May 1, 1995, aged 91, was the oldest surviving Essex player. He won an Oxford Blue in 1925 as a middle-order batsman and medium-pace bowler and played 14 times for Essex. He won five England rugby caps.

RICKARDS, KENNETH ROY, who died on August 21, 1995, aged 71, scored 67 on his Test debut when he was part of the West Indies team that crushed England by ten wickets at Kingston in 1947-48. However, this was a difficult time to be a West Indian batsman whose surname did not begin with W, and Ken Rickards played only once more, at Melbourne on the tour of Australia in 1951-52. Rickards played for Jamaica from 1945-46 to 1958-59 and made his career-best 195 against British Guiana in 1950-51, which won him a place on the Australian tour. He came to England to be professional at Darwen in Lancashire; he also played twice for a Commonwealth XI in 1952, and against a similar team in 1953 for Essex. Supporters raised money in Jamaica to pay his fare home before the 1953-54 series against England, though scores of 75, 35, 0 and 1 in the two matches between Jamaica and MCC were not enough to win him selection.

RIGG, KEITH EDWARD, who died on February 28, 1995, aged 88, was Australia's senior Test cricketer before his death. Rigg was a strong, stylish batsman who flourished in the 1930s, though in an era of great batsmen he was often overshadowed. After making his Victorian debut in 1926-27, it took him a while to get established in the Shield side. In 1930-31 he was picked for the Test squad when he was supposed to be sitting his economics finals at Melbourne University; after getting special dispensation from his professor he was rather embarrassed to be made twelfth man, a position he maintained for three more Tests until he finally got his chance at Sydney. West Indies caught his side on a sticky wicket and achieved their first win over Australia: Rigg scored 14 and 16. On the same ground a year later he hit his only Test century, 127 against South Africa, made partly in tandem with Bradman. But Rigg was ignored for the Bodyline series of 1932-33, which was surprising since he was a fine hooker and cutter, and his eight Tests were all at home--he never toured, although in 1930, when Australia brought only 15 men to England, he was told by a selector he would have been the 16th. His final Test record was 401 runs at 33.41. In his 87 first-class games he scored 5,544 at 42.00. For 30 years, he worked for a large farm machinery company in Melbourne and became their public relations director. He was a Victorian selector for many years and remained a regular at the MCG into old age; he was a particular admirer of Steve Waugh's batting.

RIPPON, THOMAS JOHN, died in Swansea on December 29, 1994, aged 76. Jack Rippon was understudy to Glamorgan wicket-keeper Haydn Davies, but appeared in only three first-class matches in 1947 and 1948.

ROBERTS, HARRY EDMUND, committed suicide by throwing himself under a train in Coventry on September 26, 1995, aged 71. He was a left-handed opening batsman who made five appearances for Warwickshire in 1949 and 1950 and was a well-known club player round Coventry.

ROUGHT-ROPUGHT, BASIL WILLIAM, who died on October 27, 1995, aged 91, was a left-hand amateur batsman who played for Norfolk for many years and made four first-class appearances for the Minor Counties and Gentlemen's XIs between 1933 and 1938. His two younger brothers both won Blues at Cambridge.

ROWE, CHARLES GORDON, died on June 9, 1995, aged 79. Gordon Rowe remains one of a select group of players who have made a pair in their only Test match. He batted No. 6 in the New Zealand team that lost by an innings to Australia at Wellington in 1945-46, a game given Test status only retrospectively. L. A. Butterfield, who followed him to the crease in that match, is the only other New Zealander to achieve this dubious feat. Rowe played for Wellington and later captained Central Districts.

ROWE, RAYMOND CURTIS, who died on May 14, 1995, aged 81, was a left-hand batsman who played ten matches for New South Wales. On his debut, against MCC in 1932-33, he scored 70.

SCOTT, Dr EDWARD KEITH, MRCS, died on June 3, 1995, aged 76. Keith Scott was a magnificently successful schoolboy leg-spinner, taking 244 wickets in five years at Clifton. He was an impressive batsman as well, and when he left in 1937 went straight into the Gloucestershire team. He played five times for Oxford in 1938, but did not show the same form. Most of his subsequent cricket was for Cornwall. He followed his father both into the England rugby team, winning five caps, and into his general medical practice near Truro.

SHARP, HARRY PHILIP HUGH, who died on January 15, 1995, aged 77, was an old-fashioned kind of cricketing stalwart who spent his entire adult life at Lord's except for the interruption of war, when he was an able seaman--which is why he was known as The Admiral. He joined the Lord's groundstaff in 1934 and stayed on as player, coach, MCC umpire and Middlesex scorer for 60 years. He did not make his Middlesex debut until he was back on dry land in 1946, when he was already 28. At first he struggled to win a regular place in that dynamic batting side, but he did play in the famous match at Cheltenham in 1947 when his batting and his off-spin were vital in the win that decided the Championship for Middlesex. In 1948 he was capped, became the regular opener in 1950, and in 1953 scored five of his ten career hundreds. He was released in 1955, and became an MCC coach, a job he held for 17 years. For 20 years after that, he was Middlesex scorer, until retiring in 1993. In this post, he acquired an extra, unofficial, job as Mike Gatting's Mentor. In all his roles he was genial, humorous, knowledgeable and helpful and he was a much loved figure on the circuit.

SHAW, Capt. RORERT JOHN, MBE, who died on August 5, 1995, aged 95, appeared in seven first-class matches for the Royal Navy and the Combined Services between 1926 and 1937. He averaged 40.84 and hit 119 for the Services against the New Zealanders at Portsmouth in 1931. Aged 16, he served as a midshipman in the Battle of Jutland was awarded an MBE aged 19.

SITARAM, PONNUSWAMY, who died on September 13, 1995, aged 68, took 253 Ranji Trophy wickets for Services, Railways and Delhi. He then became a groundsman, working on several major grounds. His last big assignment was at Lucknow for the India- Sri Lanka Test in 1993-94. He was involved in preparing the World Cup pitch at Gwalior when he was taken ill.

SMITH, HARRY THOMAS OLIVER, died on July 13, 1995, aged 89. Tom Smith only played 23 matches for Essex, on holidays from the Midland Bank, but established a reputation as a useful amateur fast bowler. In his first season, 1929, he bowled three Middlesex batsmen in four balls: his last victim was Walter Robins, whose middle stump was broken. He took six for 56 against Derbyshire in 1930 and five for 38 against Kent in 1933. At club level, he scored more than 50 centuries.

SOLOMON, CYRIL MOSS, who died on July 15, 1995, aged 84, played 13 matches as a middle-order batsman for New South Wales between 1931-32 and 1939-40 (with a six-year gap) and scored 131against South Australia at Adelaide in his last season.

STEVENSON, HUGH, who died on August 12, 1995, aged 60, was chairman of the Scottish international selectors. He died in Dublin from a heart attack immediately before the annual Ireland v Scotland first-class match, which was cancelled as a gesture of respect. He was also vice-chairman of the Scottish Cricket Union.

STRYDOM, WILLIAM THOMAS, died on February 22, 1995, aged 52, after being shot during a robbery on his business premises at Pietermaritzburg on February 20, 1995. He was one of four brothers who all played for Orange Free State, appearing in 80 first-class matches as a medium-pace bowler and lower order batsman.

SURITA, PEARSON HARVEY ST REGIS, who died on October 1995, aged 82, was an Indian cricket commentator with a distinctive fruity voice. He commentated for the BBC on India's 1959 and 1967 tours.

TRICK, WILLIAM MERVYN STANLEY, died on October 27, 1995, aged 78. Stan Trick was an amateur left-arm spinner who came out of South Wales League cricket to play 19 matches for Glamorgan between 1946 and 1950. Seven of those games were in Glamorgan's Championship campaign of 1948; in his first match for two years, he bowled Glamorgan to victory over Somerset with match figures of 12 for 106. When he appeared again three weeks later he took a further ten wickets, for 71. To the disappointment of local headline-writers Trick was not quite as successful again, and business commitments meant he could rarely play for the county, though he took plenty of wickets for Neath and Briton Ferry Steel.

VAULKHARD, PATRICK, who died on April 1, 1995, aged 83, was a hard-hitting Derbyshire amateur in the seven seasons after the war. He made only one century in his 122 first-class innings, but this was 264 at Trent Bridge in 1946, the highest score of that season and the third-highest score in cricket history by a player who never made another century (behind Pervez Akhtar's 337 not out a 1964-65 and C. R. N. Maxwell's 268 in 1935). Pat Vaulkhard's innings always created a sense of expectation, because he was a regular six-hitter--he once lofted the ball over the football stand at Bradford--even though he had almost no backlift: his batting relied on the punched straight drive. He was a protégé of Sir Julien Cahn, and played nine times for Nottinghamshire before the war, without much success. But his cricket improved, as Nottinghamshire discovered. He batted seven hours for his 264 against them, and his partnership that day of 328 with Denis Smith remains a Derbyshire fourth-wicket record. Vaulkhard was Derbyshire captain in 1950, when they finished fifth.

WALCOTT, J. HAROLD, died in May 1995. Harold Walcott was one of West Indies's leading umpires, who stood in four Test matches, all in Barbados, between 1947-48 and 1957-58. He was respected for his fairness and courage, wrote Tony Cozier, the former epitomised when he gave his nephew, Clyde Walcott, out lbw for 98 in a Test against India, the latter when he no-balled Tony Lock for throwing in the MCC match against Barbados in 1953-54.

WARR, ANTONY LAWLEY, died on January 29, 1995, aged 81. Tim Warr was a wicket-keeper who played five first-class matches, four for Oxford in 1933 and 1934 and one for MCC in 1950. He won two rugby caps for England and taught at Harrow for 30 years.

WHARTON-TIGAR, EDWARD CLEMENT, MBE, who died on June 14, 1995, aged 82, was a benefactor to Kent, a committee member for ten years and president in 1977. He had the world's largest collection of cigarette cards--over a million in 45,000 sets; it has been bequeathed to the British Museum. During the war he was a saboteur for the Special Operations Executive.

WILSON, BEN AMBLER, who died early in 1995, aged 73, played for Warwickshire against Scotland at Edgbaston in 1951. He later played for Suffolk and coached at Blundell's School.

WRIGLEY, MICHAEL HAROLD, who died on January 13, 1995, aged 70, was a fast-medium bowler for Harrow, Combined Services and Oxford at a time of very strong university cricket: he won a Blue in 1949. Later he became a foreign intelligence officer in the Far East. His professional techniques were acquired earlier: he once burst into Vincent's Club as an undergraduate and announced that he had deceived the referee in a college soccer match and achieved a lifelong ambition by handling the ball into the net.

WYATT, ROBERT ELLIOTT STOREY, died on April 20, 1995, aged 93. The oldest living England player at the time of his death, Bob Wyatt led England in 16 of his 40 Tests, and in a first-class career spanning 35 years captained Warwickshire and then Worcestershire. Conservative as a captain, and technically correct rather than a dashing batsman in the amateur tradition, he was and remained throughout his long life an astute and perceptive thinker on the game. The change of the lbw law in 1935, which he deplored as inhibiting the glories of off-side strokes, remained a particular bone of contention.

Wyatt's family financial circumstances precluded his expected progress to Surrey, the county of his birth, via public school and Oxford or Cambridge. He was working and playing club cricket in Coventry when, aged 21, he was offered a 12-match trial by Warwickshire in 1923. F. S. G. Calthorpe, Warwickshire's captain, initially underestimated his batting potential, using him instead as a medium-pace swing bowler, but he went in No. 9 and scored a century against Worcestershire at Dudley in 1925, in a stand of 228 with A. J. W. Croom--still a county record for the eighth wicket--which led to his recognition as a batsman. When Calthorpe was away ill in 1926, Wyatt was promoted to open, with great success. He made the first of 14 consecutive appearances for the Gentlemen at Lord's and, passing 1,000 runs for the first of 17 times in England, finished the season eight wickets shy of the double.

Selection for MCC's 1926-27 tour of India, Burma and Ceylon followed, and with around 1,800 runs and an average of more than 50 he revealed the powers of concentration and endurance that put him in good stead for future tours. He played in all five Tests in South Africa in 1927-28 and, although his omission from the 1928-29 tour of Australia was a setback, and surprising in view of his 2,408 runs that season, he was a regular selection for MCC touring teams until the outbreak of war in 1939. In 1929 he was even more prolific, with 2,630 runs in all cricket. His maiden Test hundred, 113 against South Africa at Old Trafford, was the first century for England since the Great War by an amateur. Though he had command of all the attacking strokes, as he demonstrated on such occasions as the Scarborough Festival, he gave defence top priority and thrived on adversity. The sterner the struggle, the more he seemed at home. The secret of his success lay in his back-foot play and correct initial movement based on observation of Fry and Hobbs.

Wyatt's rise to the England captaincy, however, caused enormous controversy. He was chosen in place of Percy Chapman for the Oval Test of 1930. There were strong attacks in the press, and he received vitriolic, even threatening letters. The Ashes were at stake, and England lost by an innings. However, Wyatt was seen to have done a decent job with great dignity. And after the Bodyline tour of 1932-33, when he was vice-captain to Douglas Jardine, he was luckier when he next captained England: against Australia, at Lord's in 1934. A sticky wicket and Hedley Verity's 15 for 104 brought England their first Ashes win there since 1896--and their last to date. It levelled the series at one apiece. But with Bradman again passing 200, the Ashes were once more lost at The Oval. There were further series defeats for Wyatt in the West Indies in 1934-35, when a short-pitched ball from Manny Martindale broke his jaw in four places in the Fourth and deciding Test, and by South Africa in 1935, though he scored 149, his only other Test hundred, against them at Trent Bridge. The captaincy then passed to Gubby Allen. Wyatt also lost the Warwickshire captaincy in 1937 after eight seasons of difficulties with a committee looking for something other than his methodical approach. Eventually the club turned to the lighter-hearted Peter Cranmer. The furore this caused was the mirror image of the one surrounding his England appointment and there was a widespread feeling that he had been treated churlishly. The club tried to keep Wyatt at Edgbaston after the war, but he accepted an offer to join Worcestershire and from 1949 to 1951 captained them to third, sixth and fourth in the Championship, their most successful phase at the time. Though aged 50 in 1951, his final summer of county cricket, he was not beyond hitting Somerset's Bertie Buse high into the pavilion when Worcestershire needed six off the last ball to win at Taunton. With occasional matches for MCC and Free Foresters, his first-class cricket continued until 1957.

Wyatt was an England selector from 1950 to 1954; in the first year he was chairman. Two books, The Ins and Outs of Cricket and the autobiographical Three Straight Sticks, demonstrated his candid and technical nature, and in later years, as a guest in Paul Getty's box at Lord's he dispensed pithy analysis tempered with witty anecdotes while Mollie, his wife, dispensed the champagne. His longevity helped secure his reputation: the new R. E. S. Wyatt stand at Edgbaston was opened just after his death. In his own time, he was generally undervalued, because his cricket was efficient and brave rather than obviously glittering. His biographer Gerald Pawle wrote that Wyatt's qualities were always more likely to impress his colleagues than the public: outstanding ability in every department, common sense, courage, and an abiding loyalty, both to companions who earned his respect and to the game itself. No one, wrote Dudley Carew, not even Sir Pelham Warner, has ever loved the game with such a concentrated single-mindedness.